Archive for April, 2010

Myself and the members of Team Jetstream are preparing for a one hundred mile tallbike ride on May 15th. Several hundred road riders will join us for the 20th annual Reach The Beach fundraiser ride for the American Lung Association. They will all ride normal bikes, because they are pussies. But we will ride the tall, proud, heavy, awkward, janky love-machines that we built ourselves … because we’re stupid.

Now, I’m just as sick of being asked for donations as anybody. So just let me say this: the ALA is a great organization. In their advocacy for clean air, their work in smoking cessation, and their contributions to asthma research they have acheived much with little. If you have lungs — and I know you do — then you really ought to take a moment to learn about what the ALA has been doing on your lungs’ behalf. Here’s their website.

If that’s too boring and wonky for you, then just take my word for it and visit my fundraising page. I’m sorry it’s so spectacularly ugly, but that’s a great example of the ALA’s frugality: they could have spend donor’s dollars on a fancier website, but they said “no, we’ve got to spend that money on lungs.” Lungs like yours and mine. Delicious, pink, juicy lungs. Mmmm.

In all seriousness: my mother suffers from smoking-related emphysema, as did her father before her. It’s no fun — it’s a slow, irreversible slide. In her golden years, she has to lug an oxygen bottle around whenever she leaves the house. Mom and Grandpa came from an era in which tobacco company claims of the healthfulness of smoking went largely unchallenged. They used to give away away free cigarettes at colleges during finals week — that’s how they hooked Mom.

Today we’ve come to a broad societal consensus of the tremendous dangers of smoking. People still smoke, but they certainly can’t claim it’s for their health. Thanks to the ALA, nicotine is finally regulated as a dangerous, addictive drug. The ALA is doing everything they can to prevent smoking, to help smokers quit, and to protect non-smokers from smokers’ smoke. That’s what they spend your donations on.